1. Field of the Invention
The present invention concerns a process for producing an optically active 1,3-butanediol and, more particularly, relates to a process for producing an optically active 1,3-butanediol by contacting specific microorganisms or processing products thereof with an enantiomer mixture of 1,3-butanediols and collecting the resulting optically active 1,3-butanediol.
Optically active 1,3-butanediols are important raw materials for synthesizing various medicines, such as antibiotics.
2. Description of the Prior Art
As a process for producing optically active 1,3-butanediols, there has been known, for example, (1) a method of optically resolving chemically synthesized racemic form 1,3-butanediol by using an optical resolving agent (Japanese Patent Laid-Open Sho 61-191631), and (2) a method of asymmetric synthesis from 4-hydroxy-2-butanone by using a Raney nickel catalyst processed with an optically active compound (Japanese Patent Laid-Open Sho 58-204187 and Bull. Chem. Soc. Jpn., 53, 1356-1360 (1980)) or the like. However, since there are drawbacks to these methods in that expensive optical resolving agents and catalysts have to be used in both methods (1) and (2), as well as in that the optical purity is low in method (2), it has been desired to establish a process capable of obtaining an optically active 1,3-butanediol of high optical purity with an economically excellent and convenient means.